Fan Fiction: Tanga (Chapter 10 - Truth part II)

Truth part II

We opened the door to find the creature awake and mobile. While its appearance was hideous, its eyes (all four of them) were surprisingly pleasant. Their soft blue reminded me of a calm body of water. I could almost feel myself floating as I looked into its eyes.

With a better look, I realized in many ways it looked relatively human. Unlike the predictions of many Earth tales, there was no humanoid life found in the universe except for the variations of humans themselves. Humans and Jovians, while different from my Minmatar brethren and me, still had common origins. This creature though was much more foreign then a Jovian. Could this be a creature from the Milky Way? Was it possible that Vartey had gone back somehow and brought this alien with him? If it was, why did it feed off him?

When I remembered the fact that neither of us was armed, I wanted to find cover, to find protection. Whatever this thing was, it could not be good. I turned to leave when the creature said in a most inhuman voice, "Wait, please. I mean you no harm." The voice was like a howling, very much as I would expect a dog to sound like. Then as I thought about its speech, I could not recall whether its mouth had moved. Had it even spoken, or did I imagine it? Then it spoke again, "I speak in a manner that facilitates easy communication to you."

I turned to Vartey and asked him, "What's going on?" Vartey replied, "My friend here is from a planet about seven light years from where Earth had been."

"Had been?"

Vartey nodded, "As I understand it, Earth was destroyed in an experiment. It happened not long after the EVE gate closed. When we arrived in the Milky Way we found Mion's people."

I whispered to Vartey, "Are you sure. It seemed to be feeding off you."

Vartey laughed, "No, Mion has the ability to share her . . . life force to help heal others. Our connection allowed her to heal me."

"What did it save you from?"

"She saved me from dying. Let me explain, please have a seat." He led me to the chairs and began, "Let me begin at the beginning. In a far off system of EVE, one of the Petra Corp archeology teams came across some gate technology unlike anything we were using. It was far more advanced then our gates yet it was old, as old as our existence in this galaxy. One of the research groups took it to reverse engineer it. When they got it working, they not only found it could send us to distant galaxies but that it had an ability to detect other gates. The team was quickly able to detect all the gates in EVE including the Jovian gates with the feature. Then as they made some adjustments and increased the range, they started to find gates in another galaxy. At first, the team assumed they had made a mistake with the settings causing it to show false positives. Then they realized all of the gates found were either in EVE or in this other galaxy. The team gathered the locations of all the gates in the foreign galaxy and started comparing them to our star charts to see if it was an echo of the EVE galaxy. It turned out that the other galaxy had far too many gates and none of their locations fit the pattern of EVE. Then they dug up the old historical copies of the Milky Way. After only a few minutes, they started finding similarities. At this point, the research was passed to my group.

"We quickly confirmed their findings with our slightly more advanced understanding of the Milky Way's galaxy. So then, we worked on getting the gate operational. As soon as it was ready, we got it running then used it to travel to a system near earth. We decided to avoid the solar system just in case humans of Earth had become xenophobic and since the Earth would be the most likely place for a center of government.

"When we arrived, we were immediately confronted with a ship of Mion's people. The ship was amazing. It was so black that you wouldn't know it was there if it weren't for the lights. The lights outlined its shape as if it was a moon blocking the sun in an eclipse. However, when the ship moved the light source stayed constant. The ship's shape was more organic then any ship we had seen before. In many ways, it looked like the big fish of Amarr.

"We tried to communicate but our methods of communication were too foreign too each other. We then decided to use the oldest of technologies to communicate wirelessly, radio waves. As soon as we sent a message we had a reply, but it wasn't in a language we knew. We spent time trying to decipher the language comparing it to all known languages. Then they re-transmitted the message in our language. It simply said, 'Welcome Home!' As we planned another message, a second ship of similar design yet far greater in size arrived. As soon as it arrived, the first ship left.

"This new ship sent a message stating, 'Please follow us to planet Lotika.' So of course, we followed the ship. Well, at least we tried to, almost as soon it left it arrived at the planet. It took us six warp jumps to get to the planet. We later discovered they were traveling at around 20 au per second! When we arrived at the planet, they gave us landing directions. The instructions told us to shut off our engines. When we did, we found ourselves being moved to the surface of the planet. We quickly analyzed the air to see if it was breathable. It was, although the oxygen level was a bit lower then standard. It's probably similar to that of some high elevation mountains on our planets.

"When we left our ship, we were greeted by a large party of Mion's people. Their unusual look of course surprised, and in some cases scared us. They were very nice though and invited us to a room to be acquainted.

"Their buildings are amazing. Any description I give won't do them justice. Much of the buildings were made of a transparent substance like glass. However, this substance was far harder to notice, especially since their walls are barren when compared to anything we are familiar with. For example in the hall that leads to this room, besides the doors, there are several things lining the walls. There are lights on the walls, billboards, signs, vents, switches, panels, and so on. In their buildings, there are only doors on the walls. It was amazing in an odd way. Even though the floors were transparent, the ceilings were lit artificially. The lighting was warm like a star.

"Their meeting room had a huge thick white metallic round table. Around the table were chairs that were . . . gelatinous. When you sat on one, it would ergonomically conform to your body's size and structure to give you an impressively comfortable seat.

"During the meeting we discussed how life had changed for people of both galaxies. It turns out however that people from the Milky Way have been watching us for millennia. When the EVE gate collapsed, it turned out that, they assumed we went on fine without them. Restoring travel to EVE was a low priority. Five hundred years after the collapse, travel to EVE was finally restored. We discovered that we had devolved as a civilization. At first, they wanted to restore us to where we had been and felt guilty for what had happened. At the time, however, many people in their society were fighting against what technology had brought and so it was decided we would be better off alone. As time went on, few questioned the decision. Ever since, they have watched us from a distance. With all the recent warfare, they knew we had advanced far enough to embrace them technologically but not emotionally. We were too combative and self-destructive. There may have been contact with the Jovian's, but no one we met was sure if it ever actually happened."